


Whalebone and Fool's Gold

by CanisMajor1234



Series: Assassin, Witch, Heretic [1]
Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Canon Divergence, Corvo deserves good things, Low Chaos Corvo Attano, M/M, Mute Corvo Attano, Soft Witch Corvo, holy shit i hated that mission, occasionally, suggested past piero/sokolov, the fucking boyle party, you have to squint to see it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-14
Updated: 2017-02-14
Packaged: 2018-09-24 09:55:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9716207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CanisMajor1234/pseuds/CanisMajor1234
Summary: Corvo is no heretic. He has never prayed at a tainted shrine, never dreamed of darkest Void or cradled in his hands whalebone branded black. He has no love for the Abbey of the Everyman, places no faith in the Spirits, and the Outsider?Don’t be foolish. Corvo is no heretic.





	

The room at the top of the Hound Pits Pub is an open place, far too big for a man such as Corvo. He pulls the mattress off his bed, flips the frame over to make his corner smaller and to give himself some semblance of privacy. Lies in such a way so he can see both entrances to the room. Keeps his knife under his pillow. Corvo hasn’t lived like this since before he served the Empress, but that does not mean that his body has forgotten.

His body remembers hunger, going to bed on an empty stomach and waking up to headaches and familiar pains. It remembers bruises, blisters and scrapes that go septic in the air and filth. It remembers dogs and guards, sharp teeth and the hooked heads of crossbow bolts. It has been too long since he’s lived like this, but his body resigns itself to living like this again.

The roof leaks, an inconstant drip that will damage the floors if left unattended. Corvo nabs a pot from the kitchens to place beneath the water. The sound makes him want to crawl out of his skin, but that eases as time passes. The storm that rolls in helps, the thunder and roar of rain against battered walls filling Corvo’s head until he can barely hear his own thoughts. It’s like that that he finally falls asleep, curled up on the mattress and shivering beneath the thin blanket.

Silence is the first indication that something is wrong. Corvo can hear himself breathe, his heart beat in his chest, the inconstant plink of water against water. Beyond that is silence, an eerie stillness that almost vibrates in Corvo’s bones.

The Void. Here, logic is twisted and water falls upwards. Here, Corvo runs from the pain. Runs from everything, really, along broken boulevards and over illogical structures, reveling in the quiet peace of it all. There’s a certain tranquility in the Void, a serenity that makes Corvo never want to leave.

But he is not the only one to haunt this place.

The Outsider. Corvo’s hands form the title hesitantly, awkwardly. He was taught the signs, of course, remembers them vaguely. They are not ones that he has been able to regularly practice, though. He has never had any need for them until now. The Outsider smiles without mirth at Corvo’s halting greeting, at once both inhumanly beautiful and mortally flawed. Corvo supposes that’s the real allure of the Outsider, the appearance of a being simultaneously single transient mortal and a hundred timeless leviathans hiding behind a mask of flesh. The longer Corvo stares, the less corporeal the Outsider appears, until Corvo has to avert his eyes from the intensity.

Blinking. Movement without effort. Corvo blinks at the spot where he had once been, confused and awed. Disgusted, vaguely. It doesn’t take much to connect the dots, to understand that those assassins who killed Jessamine and stole Emily were the Outsider’s Marked as well. The irony doesn’t escape him: the tools that took everything from Corvo will be the same ones that Corvo uses to reclaim his life. No wonder the Outsider finds this so interesting.

A gift- the Heart of a Living Thing, formed by the Outsider’s own hands. Corvo can’t help but be reminded of the mousers that haunt Dunwall Tower, bringing “gifts” of dead mice and still-struggling songbirds. The thought makes him snort in laughter. Leviathans hunt for bigger prey, he supposes. Still-beating hearts. Creatures of metal and sparks. Voices of dead empresses. Jessamine whispers secrets from the Heart even when Corvo doesn’t want to hear them, hums cradle songs of comfort when she thinks he isn’t listening. But he is always listening, because it is her. Why did it have to be her?

Runes of whalebone and steel. Corvo cuts his thumb on the sharp edge of it, marvels at the way his blood beads on the surface worn so smooth by the passing of a hundred hands. The symbol in the middle is rougher than the white around it, charred black with fire and magic. Corvo has seen the symbol before, in books that the Abbey of the Everyman has banned. Jessamine had many such books. She recognized that the Abbey could not stamp out every practitioner of the black arts, that many of her own subjects hail the Outsider and not the High Overseer, that there is no keeping the Outsider out. Better know as much as she can about him, then, than live ignorant and blinded by the Seven Scriptures.

It was through Jessamine that Corvo learned what he knows about the Outsider, about the Void, about Leviathans. She would talk about the Outsider and the black magics of the Void at length, more so after years of plague with no cure. She feared a curse, that perhaps they had angered the Outsider or one of his Marked. Corvo wonders that as well. The Outsider doesn’t look the angry type, or the wrathful, or the vengeful. He looks… bored, really. Maybe vaguely amused and preening at the attention Corvo pays his rune.

“There will be more,” the Outsider promises. Corvo stashes the rune in the pouch on his belt. He is not sure if it will be there when he wakes. He has the feeling it will be. “Look for them in the dark, out of the way places of your city, at the shrines those have erected in my name. There, you will find the runes. And me.”

The Outsider disappears, the Void swirling in to take his place. Corvo stretches a hand into it, marvels at the weight of the darkness even as it consumes him as well. He blinks. For a moment, there is silence, then the sound of water dripping into a pot mostly full. The smell of fish and river brine. He opens his eyes to sunlight streaming through dirty windows and seagulls screeching not far beyond his window. There’s no sign that the Outsider had visited at all except the mark on Corvo’s hand and the rune in his pouch and the heart beating between his undershirt and skin.

Corvo borrows a pair of gloves from one of the servants on the way down the stairs to confer with Admiral Havelock. He has no intention of returning them.

It is dangerous, Corvo knows, to go seeking out things one does not understand. He cannot help it, though- he seeks out the Outsider’s shrines, eager and desperate as a drowning man seeking land. Silence hangs heavy around the constructs of fabric and wood like a piece of the Void caught in reality. Perhaps that is why the Outsider can pass so freely through the shrines, because they are one with the Void and the Void is one with them.

Regardless, the shrines are the only places Corvo can see the Outsider, outside of dreams, and he tries to make the most out of every moment. It is not easy. At least the Outsider understands that to speak back he need not sign- Corvo is mute, after all, not deaf. And if the Outsider asks for clarification of some signs as often as he answers Corvo’s questions, Corvo tries not to let it irritate him. Corvo’s hands speak quickly, after all, often using signs that are faster but more vague or that were made between himself and Jessamine (and, later, Emily). Corvo forgets, sometimes, that none outside his little triangle of happiness can actually decipher the signs. The three of them had almost developed an entirely new language of gestures and motions, and it is as simple in practice as it is convoluted and complex in meaning. Whole phrases were often replaced with singular motions.

But the Outsider is nothing if not a quick and avid learner. He does not show it often, but every now and then Corvo can see a curious smile tugging at the Outsider’s lips at the explanation of a particularly strange sign, a twitch in the whale-god’s fingers as though he wishes to mirror the motions of Corvo’s hands. The thought of the Outsider sitting alone in the Void, struggling through a particularly difficult gesture or twist of fingers, makes Corvo chuckle every time.

“ _Surely you’ve marked mute people before_ ,” Corvo signs, sitting with his back against the wall and a book about magic in his lap. He’d stolen it from the Abbey of the Everyman just before he’d branded High Overseer Campbell. It had looked interesting at the time. Now that he is reading it, he realizes that he has started in the middle of a set that is meant to explain magic simple to extravagant, and that the volume he has is so far above his head that he can hardly make heads or tails of it.

“I have,” The Outsider says, high and haughty. They’re behind the house where Granny Rags once resided, though it looks like she hasn’t been back for some time. Perhaps she has found a new place to build her shrine and has just left this one here. Perhaps she has met her demise in a gutter somewhere. Corvo doesn’t know. “However, you are by far the most interesting.” And that is perhaps the closest Corvo will ever get to a compliment from the Outsider. ‘Interesting’. But that’s alright. Corvo has certainly been called less flattering things.

A rat skitters across the broken stone, a scrap of food held firmly in its mouth. Corvo shrinks a bit away from it before he can stop himself- it’s unsure if the rats are actually the main carrier of the plague these days, what with the weepers and the infected water, but Corvo would really rather be safe than sorry. The Outsider makes a face of irritation and vague disappointment. Corvo makes a sign with a single finger that can’t be mistaken for anything else.

The Loyalists have found a safe home in the Hound Pits Pub. Everyone takes great pains to ensure they are not followed. Corvo is no heretic, has never felt any real need to bow down and kiss the Outsider’s feet, but even he cannot deny that the Outsider’s presence tends to make life a little less unbearable. The shrine he creates is inconspicuous, a small monument of the bone charms and runes that he finds in the city and scraps of purple fabric cut from the other shrines he has visited. He sometimes catches Calista running her fingers along the wood of the table it rests on whenever she leaves the room.

Emily is ever curious when she climbs the tower to Corvo’s room. He tries to keep her away from the shrine at first, but there’s no stopping her inquisitive nature. Corvo supposes he cannot blame her. Like her father, Emily is drawn to to shiny things, and the Outsider glitters like fool’s gold. She cradles bone charms like baby birds, careful of soft fingers near the sharp edges of bone.

The charms sing sick, dark, corrupted. Magic is intent, and the intent behind the charms that Corvo finds was half-assed at best. The magic is vile, foul. Corvo breaks the charms he finds, dispels the tainted magic. Returns the pieces to the deep and remakes the charms from bits of whalebone stolen from slaughterhouses and washed up on half-forgotten beaches and treated with herbs filched from nobles’ kitchens. The songs they sing are clear, woven with silver and happiness, and give nightmares no longer when stashed beneath the pillows of little girls.

 _Her childhood, gone_ , Jessamine whispers, spits, and her voice is filled with pain. _Gone like childish things, like dolls and children’s games. Now, she is a pawn in the games of men._

It is a stroke and twist of luck that the kidnapping of Sokolov goes as smoothly as it does- the scientist’s house is a fairly simple place made infuriatingly complex by the number of guards, the scientist’s machines, and the Overseers with their music boxes. Corvo gets turned around on himself twice trying to find his way up to the greenhouse on the roof without tripping any alarms or getting himself fried by the Walls of Light.

Twice Corvo almost gets caught, only to be saved by odd touches of uncanny luck that turn heads just the right way. The first is a clumsy guard missing a step and tumbling down the rest, drawing his friend over to laugh at his plight. The second is a falling glass shattering on the hard floor, beckoning servants and guards alike to help clean up the mess. Both times Corvo presses a kiss to the Mark through the fabric of his glove, sending a wordless thanks the the Outsider for his interference.

Piero and Sokolov. Hesitant and arrogant genius. Two sides of the same coin. Corvo was not convinced, at first, bringing Piero to interrogate the Royal Physician, but Piero happens to know details about the man that only a lover would know. Personal secrets. Favorite brandy. It’s expensive, but it’s worth it to figure out what exactly Sokolov knows.

The Boyles. Corvo sighs, rubbing a hand over his face as he makes his way up the stairs. It is still early in the morning, and the party is not set to start until late into the evening. Corvo has already decided that some sleep will probably do him much good. He hasn’t been getting enough of that lately, sleep, and he’s starting to make simple but costly mistakes- a fall a bit too hard, a step a bit too heavy, a motion a bit too quick. It is the little things like those that cause accidents to happen, and Corvo cannot afford accidents, not now.

He’s still tired when he leaves the Hound Pits Pub for Boyle Manor. It’s the kind of thing that can’t be avoided. Martin shoves a vial of remedy into Corvo’s hand before he ever gets onto Samuel’s boat. Corvo supposes that’s the closest thing to a “good luck” he’ll ever get from the newly-minted High Overseer.

A shrine right across the river from the Boyle Manor. Corvo supposes that whoever constructed it was either incredibly brave or incredibly foolhardy. Either way, they’re dead now. The plague spares no one, it seems, not even the Outsider’s loyal. Corvo makes certain his mask is tight crawling through the window and into the disease-riddled room. Piero was kind enough to create for Corvo a mixture of sleep-medicine and poison that weakens the weepers enough for the plague to finish them off quickly. Small mercies.

“Going to a party, Corvo?” the Outsider asks. His footsteps are soft on the stained floorboards; outside of the Void, the Outsider is more corporeal. Levitation is apparently no longer an option, or maybe just not an option that the Outsider indulges in. He is still incredibly graceful, motions unnaturally smooth. His skin gives off a soft glow, lavender-white like burning whale oil. “I never took you for a man who _enjoys_ the frivolities of high society.”

Corvo makes a face, huffs in irritation when he realizes that the Outsider can’t see his face. _I don’t_ , he signs with one hand, pulling the sheet off the bed to wrap the body with. Hopefully it will keep the flies off until the City Watch finds them. Hopefully. Corvo pities the guard that finds them.

Lifting himself into the window, Corvo pauses when he realizes the Outsider hasn’t disappeared yet. Instead, he is standing a polite distance behind Corvo, face covered by a simple, elegant mask. A snake, all pressed scales and muted gold. It suits him. Corvo sighs, resigning himself to the fact that he will have a plus-one to this event. He pulls the thick stationary out of his coat, showing the Outsider that he only has a single invitation. The Outsider smirks as he produces an identical invitation seemingly out of thin air.

With that settled, Corvo slides out the window and begins across the bridge. The Outsider at least has enough sense to keep a step behind Corvo, close enough not to get lost or separated but leaving enough space so not to tread on Corvo’s heels. Having someone so close behind makes Corvo a bit apprehensive, but he knows better than to try and say anything. It would be a waste of breath; the Outsider is determined to be here, and so long as the whale god doesn’t do anything to jeopardize the mission Corvo really doesn’t have any reason to object. It’s his paranoia telling him that something will go wrong. Corvo wishes it would just shut up.

Even before the gates, Boyle Manor looks excessively opulent, almost to the point of distasteful. Corvo straightens as he approaches the light, trying to focus on shifting his gait from “stalking” to “striding”. Much of the appearance of nobility, Corvo realized when working with Jessamine, is in the walk- move with purpose, like you have a schedule too full for the people around you and you have some place to be right this very moment, and no one in their right mind is going to stop you. From the sharp click of the Outsider’s shoes as he trots to walk at Corvo’s side, he seems to have adopted the same mindset. There’s something daintier about his walk, though, something more elegant than Corvo can manage. Apart, they might not have looked like the kind to attend Lady Boyle’s party, but together they might just make it past the gate security.

The inside of the Boyle Manor is just as gaudy as Corvo imagined. An excessive number of paper lamps line the path- the very same kind often used to light the Outsider’s shrines. Gold embellishes everything that it can, hanging from the arches and glittering in engraved wood and stone. Corvo wonders how much of it is real and how much is gilded, false and cheap and covered only by a thin sheen of beauty.

“A party, a duel, a game,” the Outsider murmurs under his breath, amused, as they approach the door to the manor proper. “This is turning out to be quite the eventful night, isn’t it?”

Corvo huffs out a laugh, shaking his head. He can’t say he misses this part of high-society; lords and ladies and their frivolties have always been more excitement than Corvo prefers. At least, more than he prefers now that he’s older. When he was a younger man, just taking his place on Jessamine’s guard, parties like this had been the highlight of his week. Or month. Depending on the season.

It’s towards the end of the season of the most parties, though, and it looks as though the Boyle Ladies have decided to go all out to make a final, dramatic impression. Every room is dressed differently, with little tables of unique foods, though none as impressive as the table set in the main hall. Rare fruits, dangerous predators now prey- Corvo pities the man or group of men who hunted that shark. He marvels the chef who managed to cook the entire thing whole.

The Outsider seems very interested in the going-ons of a particular group of lords in one of the rooms. Corvo leaves the Outsider there with a promise that he will not be far. If Corvo intends to find out which Boyle Lady is his target, he’s going to have to mingle. The acknowledgement of that fact makes him grimace behind his mask.

Mingling is perhaps the most tedious part of a job like this. The Heart makes it easier, sure. Jessamine whispers secrets into Corvo’s ear, digging up the dirt these lords and ladies have buried and spilling it all into Corvo’s willing hands- Miss White has an almost unhealthy love of the sparkling cider that the Boyle Ladies serve at their parties. Still, the Heart doesn’t completely eliminate the necessity of actually _interacting_ with people. Corvo fetches a glass from the main table, offers it to moth-masked lady with a (hopefully) curious tip of his head. His own mask does not really allow for drinking, and he is thankful for that. One less modicum of normalcy he has to keep up.

“Oh, aren’t you a daring lad? Don’t worry: I like men with poor taste.” Miss White purrs, reaching out to tap the edge of Corvo’s mask with one manicured nail. It takes all the patience and nerve he has not to flinch. Instead, he lets his arms fall wide, palms open up as he shrugs and hums in his throat. Better to appear as a man who prefers not to talk than one who can’t.

Miss White takes the bait, moving almost uncomfortably close. “You have done me a favor, haven’t you? Let me return it. You must be playing the game, tonight. For the Boyle Cameo.” She pauses, eyes flicking about the room. “Waverly Boyle is in the white tonight. Esma is in the red. Isn’t she so pretty in that?” Miss White laughs and takes a polite step back. Corvo huffs in laughter as well, dipping his head in thanks. With the mask and the makeup and the loud outfit, he really can’t tell if any of the outfits compliment the women wearing them. Still, knowing who is who is certainly one step closer to Corvo’s ultimate goal. Now he just needs to know which one is his target.

The Outsider is exactly where Corvo left him. The group around him has grown quite a bit, a reasonably-sized gaggle of lords and ladies drunk on the Tyvian red and the anonymity of their masks. They’re beginning to get rather handsy with one another. The line of tension in the Outsider’s shoulders says that he is not comfortable with the situation. He starts when Corvo brushes a hand over the small of his back, soft brown eyes flickering black for a moment before he steels himself again. The room adjacent is all but empty, red candles burning low on dark wood tables. Corvo tries not to think about how they must look, close enough to keep others from seeing what Corvo signs against the Outsider’s chest.

He needs to get upstairs, Corvo does. The main stairs are protected by a score of guards and a massive Wall of Light. The servant stairs, however, shouldn’t be so heavily guarded. Corvo thinks he saw a single guard lingering just past the doorway the last time he passed, but it certainly didn’t look like a permanent post. The Outsider slips something into Corvo’s breast pocket just before he goes. _For luck_.

Corvo lets out an inelegant snort. It’s less luck and more the Outsider’s magic and a series of unfortunate events that guides Corvo’s fate at this point. Still, he smooths a hand over the fabric, feeling out the form beneath. It’s a bone charm of some kind, that much Corvo can tell, singing clean and clear opposite the Heart beating against Corvo's  chest. He won’t ask what it does. Probably better he doesn’t know.

The upstairs of the Boyle Manor is just as lavish as the downstairs. Corvo finds the painting that Sokolov painted, as well as a series of other portraying the Boyle Ladies in various poses. They’re impressive. Corvo isn’t an artist, doesn’t actually know the first thing about art or painting, but he does wish he could spare a few more minutes to admire them.

He doesn’t have more than a moment, though, not with the sheer number of guards that the Boyles have guarding their quarters. The diaries Corvo finds are a wealth of information- most useless, some far too detailed, few helpful. But the few helpful tidbits that Corvo can find can be stretched for miles. Lady Waverly is careful, so terribly careful, but she drops a name, and that will be her downfall. Corvo slows time just enough at the top of the stairs to slip through the Wall of Light and into the party again. If anyone notices the strangeness of a man suddenly appearing among them, no one says a word.

Waverly Boyle is in the white tonight. Corvo watches her carefully, considers how best to get her away from the crowds and alone. He has not had to kill a single target of his yet, but this time he may not have any other choice- Lady Boyle is too noble a lady with too good a reputation to be easily slandered and thrown down in a single night. With the High Overseer’s favor, it would be damn near impossible.

“There’s a man who wishes to speak with you,” the Outsider murmurs, sliding up to Corvo’s side. From where they stand, they can see Waverly Boyle flirting with a few men, clearly drunk, the top buttons of her blouse open in a way that must be meant to be enticing. Really, it just seems distasteful. Beyond her, Corvo can see the man the Outsider is speaking about- Lord Brisby, wearing a mask that looks positively ghoulish. His gaze flicks between Waverly and Corvo, hungry and fearful.

 _“He loves her from afar, always just beyond arm’s reach,”_ Jessamine sing-songs, something between amused and so very, very sad. _“He only wishes to keep her safe, keep her close. Keep her happy with riches the likes of which she has already seen. But she will never be happy, not when he takes her so far from here.”_

But she is gone now, and there is nothing Corvo can do to change that. He doesn’t know what would have been worse for her, death or leaving her to whatever fate Lord Brisby has planned for her. Let her live to redeem herself, perhaps. Find happiness in her own way, just as Corvo has. He understands, however, that not everyone is as strong-willed. Not everyone has his conviction. Not everyone has something left to fight for.

When they slip into the sewers, the Outsider steps into the water and disappears. Corvo does not know how or where. Corvo will not bother asking.

Emily plays hide-and-seek with Calista, but only Emily seems to have fun with the game. Really, Calista just gets aggravated, sitting and stewing in the booth with the book open in front of her. Corvo will not give away Emily’s hiding places, but he knows the most certain places she might be. When she’s not in Corvo’s room, he heads down to the base of the tower. There, on the cracked stone and among the lush bushes, Emily sits and plays with makeshift dolls in a makeshift dollhouse that’s little more than a crate with a few extra boards stapled on the inside. It’s sad, to see her reduced to this- Corvo’s heart aches at the sight. He sits down across from her, picks up a discarded doll and hovers it hesitantly over the chalk circle where it had been resting.

“That’s the pirate,” Emily whispers, half-concentrated on whatever she’s doing in the ‘house’- or, ‘ship’, Corvo supposes from the stick and cloth that has been stuck through the top. “He knows that there’s a leviathan coming, but the people inside don’t know yet. He’s going to save them. Somehow.”

Corvo huffs in laughter. That’s the thing about Emily’s stories: she has great ideas about how they start and how they end, but the middle is always a vague area that she makes up as she goes along. It’s amusing, the kind of nonsensical madness she can come up with. He wonders what kind of stories Emily makes up to explain his absence. Not good ones, probably.

Short signs- Calista is waiting. Emily sighs, setting the dolls down in the box. She knows better than to argue, because they’ve already had the conversation about how Calista’s lessons are just as important as sea battles and whale hunts. And yes, Corvo agrees that Calista’s lessons would probably be more interesting if Calista knew how to twist them into good stories that Emily would remember. And yes, Emily still has to go to them even though she doesn’t like them. They can play together later, after the lessons, so long as Corvo isn’t sleeping or busy.

It’s time for the endgame, for the finishing blow while the Lord Regent is vulnerable. Corvo sighs softly behind his mask as he listens. He’s not stupid. He knows the Loyalist’s agenda, knows that he will not be useful once the Lord Regent is dead. They will want to be rid of him, Corvo, assassin of the Empress and the Lord Regent. They will want to proclaim themselves the Saviors of Dunwall, not caring if that means anointing themselves with the blood of a martyr. They will want to rule from the shadow that Emily will cast. Corvo resolves not to leave until after the sun has well set, and not to sleep until he and Emily have had some time to be father and daughter again. They may not get such a chance again.

They play with dolls, play children’s games half-forgotten. Emily laughs, and it is the brightest sound.

The Outsider is waiting when Corvo falls asleep, a tired embodiment of leviathans hovering above a shrine of driftwood and violet. The whalesongs are soft, gentle, easing pain and fear and anxiety and filling space with comfort. Corvo can see their distant shapes in the dark Void that bleeds into the space around the Outsider.

Questions bounce in Corvo’s head, make his fingers twitch and itch. He knows that there is no use in asking- the Outsider will only answer in evasive riddles or, worse, truths that result in only more questions. The Outsider covets his secrets like a poor man does coin. It’s better to just let the questions die on Corvo’s wordless tongue.

The ground beneath and beside the shrine is dry, the driftwood sturdy. Corvo lets himself rest there, his back against the shrine. Here, the injuries and pains of reality are not supposed to bother him, but his body remembers aches and soreness that comes and goes like phantom claws, tearing at soft flesh and digging at tired joints. The Void may be warm, but the Outsider is cold, blunt nails scraping at Corvo’s scalp as the Outsider runs a hand through thick dark locks. Corvo winces- the last time he had something resembling a bath, it was that swim from the Boyle Manor through murky river brine. If there is a smell or foul film, at least the Outsider is polite enough not to comment.

It’s starting to get long, Corvo’s hair. Months in Coldridge without so much as a pair of blunt scissors, and even after his escape Corvo hasn’t had the time or the energy to go get it cut. He debates whether or not he should. It’s not like his hair is a liability in a fight, tucked beneath his hood as it always it, and the Outsider seems to enjoy playing with it, gathering it with long, delicate fingers, tying it back with a soft leather band, curling a lock around a single finger and letting it fall again.

“Is it time to finish this, Corvo?” the Outsider murmurs. He’s laying down now, head propped up on one hand, the other playing with Corvo’s hair. Corvo hums in his throat, a breathy thing with no real intent behind it. He doesn’t want to leave, not yet, but if he understands if his time is up here. Not even the Void can stop time’s ever-forward progression. The Outsider’s fingers fall to Corvo’s face, tracing the harsh edge of a burn scar- weeks since Coldridge, and it has yet to truly heal. It will be some time still until the mark loses its harsh red color.

 _“The one who dwells here is all things_ ,” Jessamine whispers. Not sad, not happy. Just a statement of fact. _“Is cradle songs of comfort, and bones gnawed by teeth_.”

The brush of cool lips against his temple. Corvo wakes to the sunset glow flooding his windows, coloring the water beyond a hundred shades of red and orange. It’s pretty. Lovely, really. The kind of sight Corvo had forgotten could even exist. He lingers in the windows as the light begins to fade, the sky taking on a mottled purple as the night takes hold. The first stars begin to peek from their veil before Corvo finally moves.

Samuel is quiet on the ride to Dunwall Tower. He knows what will happen, how this will end. Corvo will not hold it against the man. Samuel is a follower, not a leader. He has had no say in what Admiral Havelock and High Overseer Martin have planned to do. He says goodbye with a sad smile.

He doesn’t know what drives him to do it. Maybe it was letting the Lord Regent be carried alive in the arms of the Watch. Maybe it was thinking he was going to die from the poison in his drink. Maybe it was almost dying to Daud. Maybe it was almost dying to Admiral Havelock. Maybe it was the fucking bureaucratic bullshit that Corvo has had to put up with the last couple days- Outsider's eyes, Crovo had forgotton how much he hates that song and dance. But when the Outsider appears again for what was probably meant to be the last time, Corvo grabs the man-god-leviathan by the collar and smashes their lips together.

For a moment, Corvo is half-afraid that the Outsider is going to strike him down right there. He wouldn’t blame the god. It’s out of nowhere, likely unwarranted. But he can help but revel in the soft coolness of the Outsider’s lips against his own, the taste of salt off the god’s skin. He wants, Corvo does. He wants things he has denied himself since Jessamine. He wants things he keeps telling himself he shouldn’t want. Can’t want. He wants to hold the Outsider close, taste the sweet sting of Void from the hollow of the god’s collarbone.

The Outsider kisses back, slow and fervent, bringing Corvo back to his pace. Of course he would want to control the situation. The Outsider is in control of every other situation. This shouldn’t be any different. Corvo hates and loves how the submission makes him feel- the Outsider is a full head shorter, but it feels like he’s bearing down on Corvo, pressing against him as though he’s only steps away from consuming him. Something in Corvo tells him that he wouldn’t mind that in the slightest.

They only draw back from each other because Corvo needs to breathe. He doesn’t know if he has to here, in the Void, but his lungs strain against his chest. Against the Outsider, his skin feels flushed too warm, crawls beneath his coat like the soft, well-worn fabric is far to rough. Quick fingers undo the buttons of his coat, pushing the fabric off his shoulders as sharp teeth dig into his collarbone. It hurts. Corvo loves the way it hurts. It’s like being marked all over again, the bright flash of pain and the rush of pleasure that it brings. Like holding an ember in the palm of your hand, like holding time until even air has to strain to move in and out of your lungs.

He doesn’t know how he ends up in a bed, the Outsider pinning him between strong, silken thighs. It _looks_ like Corvo’s room back in Dunwall Tower, but he doesn’t get a good chance to look around before the Outsider’s lips are on his again, nipping and licking and demanding his attention. Corvo can only roll with the punches, scrabbling out of his shirt while the Outsider attacks his belt with all the aggression of a pissed-off river krust. The Outsider pauses for a moment, holding the belt between his hands with a contemplative expression. Corvo knows where this is going, knows it even before the Outsider begin easing his hands up over his head. He hates and loves the way his body sings as the leather bites oh-so-carefully into the skin of his wrists.

The Outsider teases and taunts, playing Corvo like an instrument he’s intimately familiar with. Breathless gasps and soundless moans scrape their way out of Corvo’s throat, and he finds himself hating his own wordlessness. Admiral Havelock had hated Corvo’s wordless tongue, as had the Overseers, but it had at least proven useful every now and then. After all, you can’t claim a verbal confession from a man without words.

“You’re here, Corvo,” the Outsider growls, teeth scraping against the sharp of Corvo’s hip- he’d lost weight in Coldridge, meals only every other day, keeping him weak, keeping him- “ _Here_ . You’re _here_ . You’re _mine_.”

 _Yours_ , Corvo thinks, and he swears it echoes around the room. His spine pops as it arches suddenly, his ribs straining beneath his skin and his wounds screaming in protest, the pain only adding deliciously to the wet-warm pleasure sinking down slowly over his hips. For a moment, he thinks that he can hear the Outsider groan, it’s hard to think when he’s teetering _so close_ to the edge. So close, yet so far away. The feeling turns his blood into molten fire, the kind that blazes too hot and too bright for far too short a time.

He doesn’t know how long the moment lasts- it could have been mere minutes, or hours, or even days. Time means very little to a timeless being. Corvo’s body has its limits, though, and only when the pleasure begins to turn to pain does the Outsider release him. The pleasure burns through his blood, leaves everything white in its wake.

It’s light when he finally opens his eyes again. The door to his bedroom is open a crack, giving Corvo a convenient view of the office beyond. Emily is sitting on the dusty rug, a number of papers and paints spread out around her. She’s talking to someone Corvo can’t see, but there’s no mistaking that careful, cool timbre. The Outsider playing with a little girl. Something about that makes Corvo want to giggle. Instead, he carefully stands, noticing the distinct lack of tackiness of his skin and the way the old sleeping pants hang off his hips a bit.

Emily smiles when Corvo pushes open the door. The Outsider smiles as well, all bright and glittery like fool’s gold. Corvo plops down beside the whale-god and listens to Emily talk all about her latest painting. Cool fingers weave with his, and, for the moment, everything is okay.


End file.
